Thursday, May 2, 2013

The Designed Salad

What is it about a wonderfully created salad that elicits a magical visual elixir of beauty? You may say, “It’s only just a salad!”, but to me there is a certain je ne sais quoi. It may be the colors, the architecture of the creation, the sense of freshness, or that moment of expectation before the first taste! Our culinary journey begins in the tiny medieval village of Balazuc, in the French Ardeche region. The salad was an incredible composition “magnifique!”

One of my very favorite salads was from “Le Pre aux Clerc” in Paris. The way they wrapped the strip of cucumber around a melon and used it as a vessel was sublime. Ernest Hemingway wrote about this restaurant located on the corner of Rue Bonaparte and Rue Jacob in the 1920’s.

The fresh and colorful ingredients of this salad Caprese are amazing! Of course the ambiance at “da Ferdinando” on FornilloBeach in Positano surely added to the experience!